Yeah, well GLAAD has really screwed up priorities, and they have for years. They are pretty much the PETA of the gay rights movement.

That was a funny segment, when Joy said "why is GLAAD picking on Glee, it's the gayest show on television?...and this is the gayest news show," or something like that. She's hilarious.

And colour me corrected, but in my limited, straight-biased view of the world, when I hear the word "tranny," I think of Tim Curry, or drag queens, so, the make-up, fabulous frocks aspect, rather than the actual "gender" part...if that makes sense...

And wow, Michelangelo is much better looking in colour than in those grainy black and white fish-eye lens radio clips...

This gay men thinks if Dan Savage was actually serious about ending bullying of gay kids he's stop telling his straight readers that "cool gay people" like him don't mind being called fags.

I totally agree that GLAAD is wrong, it's never the word, it's the context. But it would have been nice for Joy to bring on an actual transgendered person to make that case instead of a couple of gay men.

I'm sorry, guys. Every gay guy I've ever known cringes at the word "fag." "Tranny" really doesn't have the same negative connotations. It's not a valid comparison.

Even if we're comfortable with "tranny", complaining about GLAAD's effort to point out the use of the word is just shooting ourselves in the foot. Think of GLAAD the way you might the ACLU... sometimes in order to fight for what's right, they have to get on the wrong side. If they didn't, they'd have no integrity. It's hard to have (and support) that kind of dedication, but to make it a better world, somebody's got to do it.

Stop pointing your frustration at GLAAD. They're on our side, for heaven's sake. And every time they make a headline, even when it might seem overblown, they're getting someone to think about whether or not their use of terms is appropriate.

I wholly suport GLAAD's intent, but they need to take a deep breath.

(1) Context is everything. Joking self-referential use of almost any offensive word is disarming and even empowering. Call them out when they're using it as an attack or a slur.

(2) Glee. Really? You're attacking Glee? The gayest show to ever grace TV since Will & Grace? Seriously?

@6 Disagree. "Tranny" can have the same negative connotations for trans people as "fag" can have for gay men. It's all about the context and intention behind its use. The use in Glee was benign, and GLAAD is off base.

Is GLAAD using PETA's media strategist? Kooky.

I'm not transgender, so I cannot compare how the term "tranny" feels to a transgender person versus how "faggot" feels to me. But I agree that context is everything. There used to be a gay event in San Francisco called "Faggot First Wednesdays" that I loved. (The promoter also did a one-time hard rock event called "Gay Bash.")

BTW, the description of Trannyshack is somewhat wrong. It was a drag show, not a transgender dance party, though there was a DJ before and after. Though it's probably where I've seen the most genuinely transgender women (as opposed to drag queens) in one place on a regular basis.

One thing is for sure, not everyone has the same reaction to the same word. Dan calls himself a fag all the time, to another gay man that could be very biased and hurtful. The same with the word tranny, some are comfortable with the phrase while others bristle at the connotation. The way the word is used, the inflection in someone's voice and the words intended purpose can all change the meaning.

I know for me, if it is said by someone I know who loves and cares for me I would think of it as an affectionate nickname, while having it said to me by a passing stranger would automatically make me think they were using it as a homophobic slur.

Who, what, when, where and why, they all matter when it comes to name calling.

So for the people who think "tranny" is a happy word that transpeople love just because a few transpeople ever said so in their life, just like when Sarah Palin says, "Oh I have gay friends, but I still don't support gay marriage," as if that is a representative statement that gives people the right to ignore transpeople who are actually hurt by the word - it is our word, after all, so shouldn't we have more say than Mike and some other random gay man? - I'll make a deal with you:

If I hear someone say tranny or if it is directed to me, I'm hitting them in the face. If they feel that they have the right to tell me what's offensive and what's not, or try to convince me that its not the same as the bullying coming from the Christian right, then I have the right to attack them in response. Why? Because, hey, I know people who are wrestlers, people who like getting hit in the face so surely everyone else must like it to, right?

@15 you clearly represent the population of the group who is offended by "the T word," and that's fine. You are well within your rights to be offended. And if people cross that line, a line which I assume you have made very clear to those around you, then you are within your rights to defend yourself.
But making furious generalizations isn't helpful at all to your cause. I am pretty sure wrestling doesn't have much to do with enjoying a punch in the face. (Not that there's anything wrong with enjoying a punch in the face if that's your thing, either) As with pretty much any word of questionable political-correctness, some people are fine with it, some aren't. Some find it offensive, some find the reclamation of a word to be empowering.

Like Bob or Abe or my Mom said, you can't please all the people all the time.

Dear Gay Cis Men,

Why do you want to use the word "tranny" so bad? It's not your word. You don't get to reclaim it. You are not suffering if you can't use it. So shut up.

If trans people want to say the word is okay, that is their place. I don't have an issue with it, but I recognize a lot of other trans people do. Just because you have trans friends who are okay with the word doesn't mean all trans people are. You are not our spokesmen. Don't speak for us. If we want to say it's okay to use the word, that is our place. Not yours.

For some trans women I have known it is a deadly serious word. One associated with sexual assault, beatings and fearing for their lives. Leave it to the actual trans people to say whether or not the word can be acceptable. This is not a place where we need cis people speaking for us.

The next time somebody needs an opinion on the world tranny, don't go to some gay cis man. Jesus.

"Tranny" to a Transgender individual is more akin to the N word among black people than "fag" is to gay men. As a Trans woman. Yes, there are many people in the black community who use the N word in popular culture. That doesn't make it acceptable for the word to be used as if it doesn't have and has never had a negative connotation.

If Glee had dropped N bombs I don't think Joy would have brought a bunch of white people on to defend the show. She should've had Trans activists on to talk about the issue, Calpernia Adams would have been amazing, or even a positive role model from a reality show like that woman from Real World.

GLAAD does amazing work, and shouldn't be admonished for letting everyone know that the word "Tranny" is offensive and dehumanizes people in the Transgender community.

"Tranny" to a Transgender individual is more akin to the N word among black people than "fag" is to gay men. As a Trans woman. Yes, there are many people in the black community who use the N word in popular culture. That doesn't make it acceptable for the word to be used as if it doesn't have and has never had a negative connotation.

If Glee had dropped N bombs I don't think Joy would have brought a bunch of white people on to defend the show. She should've had Trans activists on to talk about the issue, Calpernia Adams would have been amazing, or even a positive role model from a reality show like that woman from Real World.

GLAAD does amazing work, and shouldn't be admonished for letting everyone know that the word "Tranny" is offensive and dehumanizes people in the Transgender community.

@21 Luckily there is no such word as ciasgendered, so you're in no danger of me using it.

@17-20 I entirely agree, but you won't get much movement from Dan on this one... I already had this debate with him regarding the word 'cunt'. Since he's ok using calling himself 'faggot' he won't really have any consideration for others. He couldn't even argue context on the cunt thing... Though I have a funny feeling he might not be so casual with the N-word.

@ 16. Thanks for completely missing the point. Gross generalizations don't work for anyone or anything, but yet so many people - so many gay people - think that it's okay to draw the line just out of the reach of transpeople. Fag is a word that some gay men use and some gay men hate. Overall, fag is a bad word to use, that is the general thought process when dealing with that word: if most people dig it - like the word gay - then go for it, but if it's known to offend and is used more often than not as a slur, keep it to yourself. On the other hand, tranny is a word used by some transpeople and hated by others, yet it's being proclaimed as a golden word by non-transpeople, as if that word affects cispeople in any way.

@22. Touche. But he's right.

@25 About the use of the word cisgendered? No, he isn't.

Cisgendered is a technical description. Tranny is a slur. Cisgendered describes the majority of people on the planet. Tranny is an insult directed toward an oppressed minority. Cisgendered is only brought up in discussions where the word is needed to make a distinction between trans- and cis- people. Tranny is used to insultingly describe trans people's looks, bodies and identities. Cisgendered would be very difficult to use as an insult. Tranny is screamed in people's faces before they're killed for just being who they are.

Words have a history and context to them. Just as there is a world of difference between the terms Caucasian and nigger, there's a world of difference between cisgendered and tranny.

@12: Zokay, drag IS a self-consciously-transgendered performance. Trans-gender, meaning across gender. Drag has persons of one biologically-interpreted gender attribution engaging in behaviors and wearing dress associated with the "opposite" gender. Drag performers may not live most of their lives as transgendered.

As for "tranny": language is all about context, not just the context of the delivery but also the context of the reception (i.e. the personal historical-cultural context of the people hearing the language). ANY word can be used, or interpreted, as an epithet or not. I can use "hero" in a condescending and disparaging fashion, and if I do it to you every day, it will take on a negative connotation. I know gay people who love the word fag, people like Dan who deploy faggot in self-consciously political fashions in an attempt to undermine the negativity associated with the term, LOTS of people with non-"White" skin tones (not necessarily "Black" either) who use nigger as a term of empowerment. On the flip side, I know people from socially unprivileged groups who have really bad reactions to these words and others. Listeners need to make an effort to read the intentions of whomever is speaking, and speakers need to make an effort to be sensitive to what they know of their listeners' social contexts/personal histories. But there are not inherently "bad" nor "good" words.

@19: YOU interpret and respond to "tranny" in the way that you (assume?) many persons with dark skin interpret and respond to the use of "nigger". You know people who feel the same or similarly. All of that is a perfectly legitimate and valid assertion, and people should avoid calling you "tranny" because you don't like it. The fact that those feelings are a legitimate description of how you feel doesn't make that the case for any particular hypothetical trans-person. The term "tranny" itself is not offensive and does not dehumanize people: the usage of "tranny" in particular contexts/cases can attempt to offend and serve to dehumanize people. It never ceases to amaze me that some of the people most-engaged in undermining an Essentialist discourse with respect to "sex" and gender do so using Essentialist language and modes of thought.

@25: No, he's NOT right. Epithets do not have the same impact on persons classified in privileged groups as they do on persons classified in unprivileged groups. Because extant social structures position people differently in relation to each other, the same treatment isn't necessarily equal treatment. This is why "cracker" doesn't carry the same weight as "nigger".

Cisgender is a neologism - "a newly coined word or phrase that may be in the process of entering common use but has not yet been accepted into mainstream language". In psychiatry the term neologism is used to describe the use of words that only have meaning to the person who uses them, independent of their common meaning. The word came into usage only in the mid 1990's.

It has yet to have a common usage. It is used only in a very specific community and in very specific context.

#18 is right. He gets to define it as he wants. In the same way that you get to define "tranny" as offensive.

" "Tranny" to a Transgender individual is more akin to the N word among black people than "fag" is to gay men."

What's that even supposed to mean? You say that as if "fag" is so clearly less offensive than "nigger" or "tranny" or something, or that there aren't varying opinions on the use of "fag".

I am willing to accept the use of "fag" by other gay people, or sparingly by people I know to be allies (for the purpose of jokes, for example). But not by other people. I don't make much use of it myself, and I don't agree with Dan, for example, that the "fag" episode of South Park made a good argument (for example, the lesson of that episode was NOTABLY at odds with the lesson of the "nigger guy" episode - in fact, it was pretty much the opposite lesson).

But doesn't it seem like there's no non-clinical/technical sounding term for transgendered/transsexual people?

Once again. If you're gay you can call other gay people fags and it's all good; you're part of the outnumbered in-group. There are a significant number of transsexuals who do NOT want to be called trannies by people who are not transexual. It's their term, not yours.

Straight people don't get to call gay people fags.
Cis people do not get to call transfolk trannies.

Please point out the flaw in my logic. Until then I will not shut up about this.

Rach31. Please stop refering to me or anyone else as cis. I find it offensive (and I have grave doubts about its etymological origins) and I respectfully ask that you stop using the term. I hear that you don't like the use of the word tranny and you believe it is hurtful I won't use it.

OK. So we're good?

This is the flaw in your logic. You're not interested in a dialog. You are interested in the illusory power of what looks to you like getting to make the rules. There's more chaos in language and gender than you believe. Definitions and power are slippery things...

Well put, Michael Wells!

@24, maybe you're missing *my* point? The point is that it *ISN'T* some "golden word" that everyone gets to use. It's like any commonly considered offensive word. Some people will use it, and some people won't. And some people don't care who they offend by using it.
You remind me of when my mum tries to shush me for using the "FUCK" word in the presence of old ladies.

PS, who appointed you OR Rach31 the official SpokesTransPerson?

I adore Dan about 90% of the time, and I think I'm a better person - and the advice I give my friends is a hell of a lot better - for reading and listening to him all these years.

But he's flat out wrong on this thing. And so are the folks complaining about "cisgendered." Every group, every demographic classification of person that academic and abstract conversation might want to refer to someone, needs to have a (relatively) value-neutral word used to describe that population. Likewise, there needs to be a word to refer to people who are not in that population. 'Cisgender' is a pretty value-neutral term, originating within the past twenty years, whose most offensive component is the fact that it's based on a cute little chemistry pun. (Google 'stereoisomer' for more on its origins. Even Wikipedia covers what a cis- isomer vice trans- isomer well.)

If you don't like the word, you're welcome to suggest something else for the clearly-needed linguistic space of "individual or collection of individuals who are not trans identified" and submit that to the collective brain trust that are academic/literary/informally-minded folks discussing these issues. If your word is better, and it catches on, then way to go you for your contribution to contemporary lexicon! If not, intent and origin surely matter, and only one of these two "offensive" words is used in the commitment of hate crimes, bullying, and other forms of dehumanizing conduct. The other is an arguably-cute pun.

As far as Dan's assertion that there's nothing wrong with the term "tranny," he's right and he's wrong. There isn't anything wrong with it. I hear trans guys call themselves that all the time. I hear gay dudes calling themselves 'faggot' all the time. I hear black folks call each other the n-word all the time... and it's all the same thing. It's not the term that's inherently offensive, it's the history and the intent behind the word that's almost always offensive. A simplification: Black folks pretty clearly said as a group a long time ago that other folks weren't supposed to use that word, because it's offensive... so we stopped. Aside from people who mark themselves as more or less racist by the use of that word, society took notice and acknowledged as a matter of respect this linguistic shift towards less mean-spirited language. Gay men and lesbians collectively decided that 'faggot' and 'dyke' aren't really words that they wanted to hear used against them anymore, and after a lot of work, eventually the same linguistic shift was granted. All that trans folks are asking for is the same thing that was allowed to black folks and gay/lesbian folks: stop using a word that's insulting. Posing to trans folks any argument that culminates in "but I really want to call you tranny!" will sound to those ears as I imagine a Black person would hear any similar argument for a non-Black person to call them by the n-word.

Which isn't to say that you're inherently wrong to use the term. Just be aware that you will not get the kind of endearing response that you might be hoping for. Slurs, of course, do not say anything about the people who are being described in such crude terms. They say worlds about the people who use them after being asked not to.

There are no individual spokes-trans-people. There don't need to be. I'm sure not one of them. Instead of listening to one or two members of a group, if you're really curious about the collective response of trans people is, go read some trans blogs. Pam's House Blend and Bilerico are good LGBT-including-the-T blogs to start with. See what other trans people are saying and what other trans people are feeling. If one opinion doesn't matter, see what language the rest of the trans blogosphere is using.

Aliem - well reasoned and thought out analysis. I appreciate it. Using the term cisgendered does not actually rise to the level of offensive for me, I was mostly using it as an example of trying to be respectful of others desires around language. You said it much better than I did.

My "dog in this fight" is about language and power. I'm aware that enemies will use language to disable and hurt. What we can hope and strive for in our communities is respect and an ability to listen to others who have an emotional (and physical) investment in how language is used. I do believe that the ability to control language is an illusion. But naming is a powerful act and having someone else name you can be a way to control you...

Blah, blah, blah... You said it better, Aliem. Good on you.